He opened his eyes, not knowing how much time had passed. He hardly dared look around for Melody. He didn’t want to see her, nor did he want to see her gone. He wouldn’t blame her if she was.
Why did he have to be such an insufferable boor? Why did he have to throw all her kindness back in her face —and not just hers, but Maggie’s and Marion’s, as well? What kind of man behaved like this? He couldn’t even properly call himself a man, if he deliberately abused every woman who came within his reach.
But he didn’t do it deliberately. He didn’t seem capable of acting otherwise, even when he knew he shouldn’t and wished with all his might that he wouldn’t. Even he wanted nothing to do with himself after the way he spoke to Melody just now. So why did she put up with it?
And she knew what sort of man he was. She saw the way he acted toward Maggie. So why did she marry him?
He resented all of them, not only these women but his brothers, too, for making him feel so bad about himself. Let them choke on it, if they didn’t like it. Let them leave him to himself, if they didn’t like him. He knew he could always be content on his own. He could live the whole year round on his trap line, never seeing another human face.
He didn’t need or want a wife. He didn’t want anyone who made him feel less than human.
He turned on his side in the bed. For the first time, he realized Melody had been sitting there, on the other side of the snow cave, the whole time, watching him. His anger flared up in his heart, but he kept it to himself.
“How long have I been out?” he asked
“A few hours,” she replied.
Paul swallowed and realized his throat was parched from lack of water. How long had he gone without eating or drinking anything? He couldn’t remember the last time, before his argument with Melody, when he’d eaten or drunk something. “I suppose you think me a blame fool.”
Melody shrugged. “Just a small one, maybe.”
He laughed a dry, hollow laugh. At least she didn’t try to gloss it over. He could respect her for that. He swallowed again. “I’m dry as a bone. Do you have any water?”
She picked up one of her little wooden bowls from the floor and held it out to him. When he didn’t reach for it, she moved over next to the bed and slid her soft, small hand under the back of his neck. She raised his head and held the bowl to his lips. He tried to hold it himself, but his hands shook so badly that he knocked the water over his chin and chest.
Melody held the bowl steady as he drank the water. He sank back, panting. All the agony from his return to consciousness flooded back. He hovered on the brink of emotional collapse, and he prayed to whatever powers existed in heaven and earth that he wouldn’t break down in tears in front of Melody. That would be the ultimate indignity.
He could live with her saving him from the freezing river and cooking his meals with hot rocks. He could sleep under a sheep skin she gave him to stay warm. He could even stand to drink from her hands. But please, if anyone out there can hear me, please don’t let me start blubbering like a baby in front of her.
The water barely cooled his burning throat, but he didn’t tell her so. He also didn’t want her to give him any more, not if he was going to make a mess by spilling it all over himself. He closed his eyes.
“I guess it’s after sundown now,” he remarked.
“Yes,” she answered.
“Where did you sleep when I was unconscious?” he asked.
An ominous silence filled the cave. Paul dared not open his eyes to check what Melody was doing. After a few minutes of torturous anticipation, he felt a weight stretching over him. He squinted up and saw Melody tucking the sheep skin around him. The skin trapped his body heat underneath it and a soothing sensation of reassurance spread through him along with the heat.
The warmer he became, the sleepier he grew. His eyelids weighed a ton and drooped.
Then one edge of the sheep skin lifted off him, the edge closest to the icy wall of the cave. Melody slipped under the sheep skin and nestled against him. His arm circled around her shoulders and drew her close.
He felt her thin frame under her dress. She’d taken off her shawl, her apron, and a few other layers. She lay next to him in her everyday work dress.
More than the heat trapped around him by the wooly coverlet, her presence comforted him and relaxed him. He understood his earlier outburst as a symptom of his weakened state. Did she understand that? Wasn’t that what she was trying to tell him, that he shouldn’t leap to any conclusions about their prospects until he recovered somewhat from his ordeal? Why did he have such a difficult time accepting that? Was it because the suggestion came from her?
None of that mattered now. He could let it all go, at least until he woke up tomorrow morning. She was here, she was with him. Nothing else mattered. Even if they never agreed on what to do about their situation, even if they argued about it until kingdom come, as long as they laid down next to each other at the end of the day, he could live with it. He could live with being married, he could live with her, and he could live with himself.
Melody sat on the edge of the bed. “I have to go tend the fire.”
Paul opened his eyes. “It’s the middle of the night.”
“I know,” she replied.
“You’ll freeze to death out there,” he argued.
Melody laughed. “I do this every night. Didn’t you notice? I have to keep the fire going. It won’t burn all night without more wood, and I can’t let it go out.”
Paul scratched his head. “I guess I must have slept through it. Are you sure you’ll be warm enough?”
Melody patted his hand. “I’ll be back before you know it.”
She picked up her mutton fat lamp and disappeared through the opening in the wall of the cave, leaving Paul in darkness.
He stared up at the blank in front of his eyes where the ceiling used to be and listened. The snow of the cave completely muffled any sounds from outside. If anything came upon them here, they would get no advance warning. Then again, they had nothing but his hunting knife with which to defend themselves if anyone or anything attacked them. That was another reason to leave here and find more permanent accommodation for the winter. Even if they didn’t make it all the way home, a snow cave wasn’t ideal lodgings.
Melody’s resourcefulness and determination could only take them so far. But he still couldn’t bring himself to give ground. He had to find another way to take charge of their situation. He couldn’t allow a woman—his wife!—to lead him around by the nose.
So she was his wife. He tried the word on, rolling it over in his mind and repeating it. Wife. What a strange sounding word it was. If you repeated it enough times, it lost all meaning. Wife. He never thought he’d live to see the day when he’d have one.
And now that he did have one, he wasn’t sure how to handle her. She wasn’t the kind of wife he’d choose for himself. He always thought of his future wife as a glorified house cat. She would cook, do the laundry, and make the beds, but she wouldn’t involve herself in the decision-making of their lives. That was the husband’s job.
And here was Melody. She looked like a house cat. She looked like a miniature Russian doll. She didn’t look strong enough to haul of drowning man twice her size out of a river. And she didn’t look like she had the mental fortitude to cut a sheep’s throat. Sure, he’d seen her help butcher deer but holding a full-grown sheep still and wrestling its dying body to the ground after you made the cut was another matter altogether.
Far from inspiring admiration for her, thinking about the sheep and his own rescue from the river made him want to withdraw from her even further. He wasn’t sure he wanted anything more than a house cat.
He heard her shuffling through the cave opening, and her candle flame filled the room with its watery light. She sat down on the edge of the bed and took off her shoes. The lamplight shone on her cheeks and her eyes flashed.
“It will last the rest of the night now,” she told him.
“I’m going out tomorrow,” he announced.
“Are you sure you feel strong enough?” Melody asked.
Paul nodded. “I’ve been lying in this bed too long. I need to get out.”
“Just go slowly,” Melody told him. “Don’t push yourself harder than necessary. Remember, you don’t have the strength you used to.”
“I know.” He sighed. “What I wouldn’t give for a horse! A man might as well not have legs at all, if he doesn’t have a horse.”
Melody studied him. “Will you have another horse at home?”
“I’ll borrow one from Parker,” he replied. “Then I’ll get a new one next summer when I sell my furs in town.”
Melody looked down at her hands. “We don’t have cowboys back home.”
“Cowboys?” Paul repeated. “I’m not a cowboy.”
Melody laughed at him. “Oh, yes, you are! You’re the biggest cowboy I’ve ever seen in my life!”
“That’s not saying much, is it?” he retorted.
“Maybe not,” Melody shot back. “but you still are one.”
“That just goes to show how much you have to learn about this country,” Paul declared. “I’m a mountain man. Cowboys don’t hunt and trap and sell their furs.”
“No?” Melody tilted her head to one side. “What do they do?”
“They farm cattle,” he told her. “Cows. They take their cows around to different places to graze, and they keep the coyotes and wolves away from the baby calves, and they drive the cattle to the sale yards once a year.”
“Oh,” Melody knit her brows. “I see. But you look like a cowboy. You have a gun and boots, and you ride a horse.”
“Everybody rides horses,” Paul pointed out. “Even the postmaster rides a horse.”
“Really?” Melody exclaimed. “I didn’t know that.”
“Don’t people ride horses where you come from?” Paul asked.
“No,” Melody replied. “We use horses for other things.”
“Like what?” he asked.
“We have cart horses and plow horses and horses to pull wagons and carriages and that sort of thing.” She gazed off into the darkness, remembering. “But people don’t ride horses to drive their cattle to the sale yards.”
“How do they get them there, then?” Paul asked.
“They walk,” Melody replied. “They walk along the road behind them, waving sticks and shouting at them to drive them forward.”
Paul rubbed his chin. “Maybe because things are closer together there, that might work. It certainly wouldn’t work here. It would take you a hundred years to walk all that way.”
“Yes,” Melody agreed. “This country is much bigger, and everything is much farther apart. I was amazed when we took the coach from Denver to Idaho, how big everything is and how long it takes to travel everywhere. In Holland, everything is small and close and everyone knows everyone else. It’s very different.”
“Do you like it here?” Paul asked. “Do you miss your home country very much?”
“I miss it sometimes,” Melody admitted. “but I’m used to this country now. I didn’t like Cleveland so much because we were in the middle of a big city, and I liked the farm land better. I wanted to get out of the city and go to live on a farm. I didn’t know, when I made myself a mail-order bride, that I would marry a mountain man.”
Paul and Melody exchanged a heartfelt smile. “You’ve made yourself a perfect mountain man’s wife since you got here,” he told her. “You’ve shown yourself capable of anything.”
Melody lowered her eyes. “I haven’t done anything particularly special.”
“What are you talking about?” Paul gasped. “You saved my life when I fell in the river, and you’ve kept both of us alive ever since. We wouldn’t be talking about it now if you hadn’t done what you did.”
“I haven’t done anything more for you than what both Marion and Maggie have done,” she pointed out. “Maggie saved you from the fever, and Marion saved Prescott from those wolves. They’ve both proved they can do anything they set their minds to.”
“That’s true,” Paul admitted. “But they aren’t you.”
Paul reached out and let his big hand fall against her small round cheek. Melody inclined her head against his palm, and his hand covered the whole side of her head. Her hair swept down onto her shoulder and she smiled up at him.
”I wouldn’t want to be out here with anyone but you,” he murmured.
Melody’s eyes shone in the lamplight. “No?”
“No.” He brought his thumb around and stroked her lips with it. “I’m glad you came to this country. I’m glad you’re here.”
“I’m glad, too,” Melody replied. “I’m glad I’m here with you now.”
His arm passed around her shoulders and she fell against his chest. Paul buried his nose in her hair, inhaling the aroma of her, and then he pressed his lips to her forehead.